Amish Barn

The Amish Barn was built in 1830 in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania of hand-hewn oak and white pine using mortise and tenon joints. This pre-Civil War structure has now been moved to a new home in Arizona at Spirit Tree Inn, where it provides a unique touch to our B&B lodging near Patagonia Lake State Park.

6/19/07 – An 1800’s Amish Barn was purchased from Chambersburg PA. It will be disassembled piece by piece, tagged, transported to Patagonia Arizona and reassembled on the Spirit Tree Inn property. More details and pictures will be added to this bulletin in the coming weeks.

6/29/07 – Yea! The footprint is coming!! Soon we can start on the foundations. What a process!! Measurements were taken while the barn was still intact in Pennsylvania. These were then used to produce a CAD drawing that we can take to the county for approval and permits. The CAD drawing is what we are calling “the footprint”.

7/10/07 – The “footprint” is here. Above are pictures of the structure: one is the barn in original condition and one is of it being dismantled. The first truckload of wood is scheduled to be in Patagonia on August 20, 2007. Depending on the curing of the foundation, the barn is scheduled to be reassembled in October 2007.

7/23/07 – First things first. The Barn has been completely dismantled. The new site for the Amish Barn has been picked out. It will be in the paddock next to the existing horse corrals. We are anxiously awaiting the engineer’s results and the final blue prints.
Tom is planning the museum of old tools and horse drawn farm implements, which will be located on the lower level of the barn. It will be a page out of history and well worth seeing. Pictures of the excavation of the foundation and footing will be soon.

8/28/07 – The first load is finally here!!!! A forty foot trailer arrived on August 22, 2007 bearing the first load of wood for the barn. We had to remove sections of fence so that the truck and trailer could get into the field where it would be unloaded. The following pictures show some views of the old wood. Construction date to be tentatively set in October based on the county accepting the plans of our structural engineer. Stay tuned!!!!

9/18/07 – We are waiting for the plans to be approved by the county but it looks like the barn will be going up the third week in October.
10/19/2007 – We just found out that, due to the Thanksgiving Holiday, the barn won’t be going up until the end of November. We hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

11/29/2007 – Well, Thanksgiving is over and we have finally started the excavation of the footings for the barn. Rain, however, has delayed things a bit. We hope to actually pour the footings next week. We will try to get pictures and post a few this weekend. We had to move the location of the barn so that it is out of the flood plain. For those of you who know the area, it has to be 200 feet from the highest bank of Harshaw Creek. Well, red tape never seems to end!!!!!

12/3/2007 – The footings for the barn have been dug and approved by the county. Soon the concrete will be poured. We will post pictures as work continues. It looks like the barn will be reassembled after Christmas.

12/5/2007 – 3 loads of concrete were poured into the excavated footings yesterday. They will dry over the weekend and then the stem walls will be poured. The workers did an excellent job.

12/27/2007 – The brick walls on which the wood will rest is almost completed. The notches in the top of the wall, seen in the new pictures, is where the summer beams will rest. The sleepers will sit on top of the summer beams and the wood floor will go down on the sleepers. Caleb was contacted today and said that he will leave Pennsylvania on January 4, 2008 and should arrive in Patagonia on January 8, 2008. It is finally happening!!!

1/8/2008 Caleb arrived yesterday with the final load of barn wood. He and his helper have already started erecting the barn. The following pictures tell the tale. More pictures to follow.

1/9/2008 Day 2 was a very successful day. More brick had to be laid on the stem wall of the open side of the barn. The sleepers were set on the summer beams and spaced evenly. The floor of the second level will eventually be laid across the summer beams. After many months of waiting and preparation, the work has begun and will continue for another 2 1/2 weeks. Please continue watching the progress. Pictures will be posted as they become available.

1/14/2008 Days 3, 4 & 5 have come and gone. The barn is taking shape. The main bents have been raised and one set of side supports has been reassembled. There is another set of supports on the other side. There is still much to do. More members of Caleb’s crew will be arriving this week and the work will progress even faster. The following pictures show some of the work accomplished last week.

The original picture of the dismantled barn has been inserted again here so that you might compare it with the pictures of the barn being reassembled. The part of the original barn on the right was an add-on and is not included in the barn as it is being assembled now.

1/22/2008 – We just wanted to add a few shots done this past week. Caleb has gone home to PA to take care of his business but the Amish crew stayed to finish the paneling, do some painting and do the last step of hanging the original barn doors. Please keep tuned for some of the final pictures of the finished barn. Of course, we still have a lot of work to do on the inside with sealing the old wood to preserve it in the drier air of Arizona and doing many more finishing touches before the museum of old horse drawn farm equipment and old tools is set up. Over the course of the next year, we plan to face the brick with native rock.

1/28/2008 – The Amish left for PA at 2:00 pm this morning on a train from Tucson. They are taking a different route from the one that they took when they came out. It will take them four days to get home. They finished the final paneling and the hanging of the barn doors on Thursday. They then took a little time to see some sights in Southern Arizona. They said that they enjoyed their time in Arizona but would be glad to get home. They enjoyed the weather and found that re-constructing the Amish barn was a learning experience. We all plan to keep in touch.